Talking with a believer

I just want to document my dialogue with another person about religion.

( I am responding to a message my fellow online user had posted. His message was in video form, so I can't quite paste in the transcript )

Me:

For now, I would just like to respond to the 'God is not a mythological god' argument. The obvious thing to say is that neither the Intelligent Spaghetti nor Lunos are 'recorded' myths, but that isn't good enough. The main point I think that Dawkins was trying to make is that all gods who have been seriously followed by people up until now, have shared an important characteristic. That is, none of their existences can be easily verified. I know, I know, you will cite several written statements of eye-witness accounts, the utter billions of people still believing today and maybe even 'miracles'. Actually, gods are only alive in 'our hearts', figuratively speaking. Gods exist through faith exclusively for now and that is why religion has no place in the areas of science, by the way.

Him:

I appreciate your honest answer. And yes, the existence of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob isn't easy to verify. But there is a characteristic that I think Richard Dawkin has missed. The God of the Bible put a test to humans as to the honest integrity of his Word. If a future oracle spoken by God doesn't come true it is not the Word of God. And historically the future oracles of the Bible have time and time come to pass. The Israelites becoming prisoners for 400 years in Egypt was told to Noah hundreds of years before it occured. The captivity of the Israelites in Babylon was spoken less than 100 years before it occurred. Daniel's prophecy of the Empires of the Medo-Persians, Greeks, and Romans hundreds of years before it occurred. And most importantly the prophecies of the Messiah's birth, life, ministry, death and resurrection was written in the Old Testament hundreds of years before they occurred. Especially Christ' birth could not be manipulated, because Jesus couldn't have told Mary and Joseph where he was to be born.
It's a good attempt to label the God of the Bible into the box of mythological beings, but God is not man that He should lie. Thanks for your intelligent conversation with me.

Me:

Thanks for your response. I don't know enough specific details to comment on the different events you listed, but I did see a video where Douglas Wilson said the foretelling of Christ's resurrection was what made him confident about his beliefs.

Here's what I think. We know that most religious texts are said to be written by people. Moreso, we know the Old and New Testaments both had several authors. When it comes to proving something in physics, such as the photoelectric effect ( allowing for solar panels today for example ), the burden is very heavy and there is a wide review process that must take place before any results are taken seriously. Everything must be tested experimentally and the math has to match the outcomes. Similarly, if a drug company wishes to release a new vaccine, they end up testing their new compound for years. Even the law has a heavy burden of proof. Eye witness accounts not good enough to convict someone of murder. The evidence must be cold and hard.

Why is it then, that events affecting billions of lives are not put under the same scrutiny. As far as I understand, most of the proof is given in the form of written text obtained after first hand testimonies. There are no clinical records showing Jesus' time of death. As for the predictions, you have to at least admit that fabrications of the written evidence is probabilistically more likely the actual events really occurring. That is, imagine that Mary is your wife in this day. She gives birth to Jesus, but you know you didn't sleep with her. And say that this very event was predicted long before it happened. Isn't it true that given the existence of the prediction, Mary could still just sleep with someone else and lie to everyone about it?

All I'm trying to say is that you should have a little bit more doubt, because a little bit of faith may not always be warranted.

Him:

I'll share some opinions but I'll tell you why I enjoy talking and sharing with those who don't really hold to a faith in what I believe in. I have lived the majority of my life in a church bubble that was so far outside reality and what is really going on in the world. What I mean is that the christian church in general has adopted a false approach to life. It is monastic in it's interaction with people. And even at a young age, I felt strongly that the church was doing things wrong. So I am a big time critic and advocate of "wakeup and smell reality" as I like to call it with the church.
So in essence, I am in a paradox. I believe strongly in Jesus Christ and I desire to obey his teachings, his approach to life, his antagonism against religious piety, but at the same time I'm frustrated with the church in general. If you get what I mean. So I love interaction with people who are walking in truth, searching for answers and desiring to live this life to the fullest.
That's alittle insight into my world. I appreciate the interaction you and others who may be agnostic, anti-religious, or atheist.

If you take the idea that Mary could have found the passage in Isaiah referring to a virgin giving birth to the Messiah, you have to realize a few things. Mary's conscience would be ripping her from the inside from the time she came up with the false claim to the time she died. Also, her cousin Elizabeth also would have lied because she was told that her husband had an angel appear and say that their child would be the one going before the Messiah. And finally Joseph would have to hold fast to the lie. Not to mention the shepherds who shared with the whole town of Bethlehem, this lie as well as pagan astrologers who came from the East. Not to mention Herod would be responsible for believing an Israelites lie and would have to account for the bloodshed of all the firstborn Jews that he murdered. Next the prophetess in Israel would have to have come up with the same lie in order to prophecy that baby Jesus would be the rising and falling of many in the nation. I mean it just goes on and on. There are two many factors to assume that Mary shacked up with a centurion and then came up with the story. Remember Joseph, her engaged husband had the right to public execution and humiliation of Mary. Somehow he believed it to be true.
And, Jesus himself was a catalyst for change in Israel. He hated the pride of the Pharisees. Multiple accounts of Jesus being crucified are spoken of by many extrabiblical accounts.
Just something to consider. Thank you for your response.

Why Islam

I saw an ad for http://whyislam.org/ on the subway today. There is a wide and spreading or wide-spread and widening conflict over Islam between many groups of people in the US today. I don't have any good opinions right now, but I want to try to name some of the groups involved as well as some events that have taken place. I also want to collect people who have written about the subject. However, I have to confess that I have a bad opinion about organized religion in general, so I may have a hard time being objective.

On the one hand, there are groups that want to highlight misconceptions about Islam, such as whyislam, or create a Western Islamic following, such as the Muslim Student Association. I suppose both want to tell the West that Islam is a religion of peace and that Islamic Extremists, are, just that. I read on whyislam.org today the argument that people should consider the difference between how women are treated by Islam and how women are treated in Islamic countries. I accept the logical distinction, but I want to learn how many women living in the Muslim world ( in and outside of Islamic nations ) are actually free to educate themselves, drive a car, teach, etc.

On the other hand, people are speaking out, saying that too many women suffer in Islamic nations. Everyone who saw the movie or read the book, Kite Runner, was able to find out about 'honor killings' in Afghanistan. I also recently saw a video from a conference held in January 2008, where women who left Islamic nations got to give their perspective.

The talk was called "Women in Islam" and gave perspectives from Wafa Sultan, Nonie Darwish, Rosine Ghawji and Cyrus Nowrasteh. The moderator was Janet Levy. The link is http://www.guba.com/watch/3000134226 , but there is an accompanying link too:
http://www.horowitzfreedomcenter.org . Their views are less flattering and more revealing.

I also recently listened to the Dec 7 2008 podcast of 60 Minutes recently. So I learned that Saudi Aramco, the Saudi Arabian oil company ( most profitable company in the world, by the way ) used to be US owned and to this day maintains a portion of land within itself where women get to live as if in the West. That is, they can drive cars, for example.

I should also note that there is an extreme end to anti-Islam too. I think they call this reverse hate speech or, just hate speech. Yes, if you turn to YouTube, you will find that there are a few videos posted with harsh music in the background while Islam gets bashed. I am happy to say that I do not have the 'media-nurtured' negative reaction toward Muslims that I unfortunately do to black people. I fear that all the online hate speech and even the New York Times-style 'do not slander Obama as a Muslim because Islam is evil' bad mouthing is going to make the 'next' young people into Islamophobes.



P.S., isn't it awesome that Jeremiah Write gets absolved 'after' it made a difference? ( Article at Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/21/meet-the-white-man-who-_n_92793.html )

YouTube censorship is so Rude

Everyone who uses YouTube should read their new rules. They are trying to censor not only the people who make videos, but even people who watch the videos made by the people who make the videos! That is, YouTube wants to modify video 'hits' or the number of times a video is watched. If they change these numbers, they just plain end up lying.

If you check out the link, you will see the mass amounts of negative criticism about what they wish to do. I also enjoyed two video comments by Thundeff00t and TheAmazingAtheist.

I posted some comments on their site too, but they are probably unreadable in the disorganized mess of comments.

Hey at least YouTube is not censoring people's disapproval.

I have some compromise ideas: keep the new rules, but do not lie to us.

- At the very least, the new profanity rules should not apply to 'old' videos. - And I also don't know what 'algorithmically demoted' means, but YouTube should state numerically how ratings will be penalized. No more than 5 bleeps per minute or no bleeps at all?

-And most importantly, do not try to manipulate the # times watched scales. The compromise: age restriction.

So what happens if YouTube does not at least accept possible compromises? Well, it is always possible to create a 'separate' indexing site to independently maintain popularity. This way, you enter and view videos exclusively through this other site and 'hits' are tracked automatically, without YouTube's interference. Someone just has to make it.

whatever: interviews and then affirmative action

The title doesn't matter to me here. I am just riffing. These notes may be useful to me later, but in general I don't want to always think about structure, so why not just get it all out first, then take the good parts--if there are any--and put them to good use.

Speaking of structure, I need to get a new job and I came across these stupid interview questions at business week. The author Liz Ryan, opinions that asking an applicant about their weaknesses is useless, because you will likely not get a real answer. A few years ago ( and likely long before ), reporters have asked still President Bush about his past mistakes without getting any answers. His work, if he has any misgivings about it or not, will be well documented in history. If he does not admit anything to himself, is that unhealthy? I tilt my head back to the Radiolab episode about Deception , where Jad and Robert investigated and found a study where lying to yourself helped you to be a better swimmer. They said lying to yourself could be an evolutionary adaptation to be more 'happy' about life.

I have gotten way off track, but I feel I agree that asking someone about their shortcomings in an interview may not give you any direct answer, but that answer is more important, the more serious the post is. So when it really counts, you should likely ask everyone but that person.

Speaking of interviews, I was reading this pretty good paper by Louis P. Pojman, "The Moral Status of Affirmative Action" in this text book ( not mine ) called 'Ethics in the Workplace' , edited by Robert A. Larmer. I haven't fully decided what I think about Affirmative Action yet, but this essay is good to read to learn about many of the core arguments for and against A.A.. There is another source, written some six years after that 1995 Pojman source, at the University of Amsterdam : http://www.science.uva.nl/~seop/entries/affirmative-action/ . I think I'll check that out soon too. At the least, I think reverse discrimination isn't fair. My morals tell me that blaming those who have innocently benefited from past injustices is not right. It is mis-directed blame. Okay, so then who get's the blame? I read somewhere--I don't know where--that money is the main way to resolve all losses in this country. I think no amount of money could repay damages to a generation of people wronged, but it just so happens that 'money used in a productive way' to balance out the education system and punish those who still try to discriminate is a much better solution anyway.

I am sure someone has created a time line of civil rights history and maybe someone has even tried to write out a plan to equalize our society. I think there are many clear steps--many of which have already been taken--to increase access to education and reduce discrimination in the work place.

Here are some more links to throw around:

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/btw/watch.html , Bill Moyers : Buying the War [in Iraq]

http://change-congress.org/

ali allawi , "The Occupation of Iraq"

Bill Moyers interview with Jon Stewart: http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04272007/watch.html

Stephen colert's 2006 press secsretary dinner is cool.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qa-4E8ZDj9s&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0r71L7cojE

Lincoln and Obama

There has been quite a lot of Obama talking Lincoln for a while now. Obama has recently been interviewed again on 60 Minutes. When asked about what he has been reading, he mentioned Lincoln. As a follow up, it was pointed out that Lincoln had taken in many of his political opponents into his cabinet and the question was whether Obama would do the same. I guess Obama dodged the question, because he doesn't want to give 60 minutes any spoilers ahead of schedule? Though eventually, I think he should consider the benefits of a well-balanced cabinet.

I especially liked this quote when reading through the Lincoln-Douglas debates Wiki:
“ Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed. Consequently he who molds public sentiment, goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions. He makes statutes and decisions possible or impossible to be executed. ”